Michael Sheen And David Tennant To Headline Good Omens TV Series

by Erik Amaya

Sometimes, you need Aro and The Doctor to hold back the Apocalypse.

Variety reports that actors Michael Sheen and David Tennant have been cast in Amazon’s adaptation of Good Omens. The 1990 novel by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman tells the tale of the angel Aziraphale and the demon Crowley, who seek out the Antichrist as the world heads into its final hours of tribulation. Of course, their ambition is to halt the End of All Things as they’ve come to enjoy their lives in the United Kingdom. Meanwhile, the Antichrist grows up in a quiet Oxfordshire town.

Sheen will play Aziraphale, guardian of the East Gate of Heaven, and Tennant will play Crawley, the original serpent from the Garden of Eden. “I first read Good Omens as a teenager and it’s been one of my favourite stories ever since,” Sheen said in a statement (via the BBC). “To be part of the team entrusted with bringing it alive on screen is a bit of a dream come true to be honest.”

“Michael Sheen, Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett and directed by Douglas Mackinnon, it’s a dream team and a dream gig,” added Tennant. “I am very excited that I’ve been asked to be part of this amazing project. Bring on the Apocalypse!”

Gaiman, who will serve as a writer and executive producer on the series, also offered a few comments. “If you are looking for actors to play two of the best-loved characters you and Terry Pratchett ever created, then, if you are very lucky and have been very good, you will get Michael Sheen and David Tennant to bring them to life. The best Welsh actor of his generation gets to be an angel, the best Scottish actor of his, a demon.” Referring to the novel as one of the funniest about the end of the world, he added, “It’s strange that it feels more relevant now than it ever did before. I only wish that Terry could be here to see it come to life with such a fantastic team.”

Despite enjoying Gaiman’s work in comics, I’ve always found his novels hard to access. Consequently, I’ve never read Good Omens. But based on the strengths of the actors alone, I’ll have to give the book a read before the series debuts on Netflix sometime in 2019.

Erik Amaya

Host of Tread Perilously and a Film/TV Writer at Comicon.com and Rotten Tomatoes. A former staff writer at CBR and Bleeding Cool, and a contributing writer at Fanbase Press and Monkeys Fighting Robots. Voice of Puppet Tommy on The Room Responds. A seeker of the Seastone Chair and the owner of a Legion Flight Ring. Sorted into Gryffindor, which came as some surprise.